Monday, April 26, 2010

National Security Advisor retired Marine Gen. Jim Jones told a joke about a Jewish merchant and Afghanistan Taliban fighter in opening remarks to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy this past weekend.

It drew laughter from the group and an immediate slapdown by Abe Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League Jones immediately apologized.

"In order to set the stage for my remarks, I'd just like to tell you a story that I think is true. It happened recently in southern Afghanistan. "A member of the Taliban was separated from his fighting party and wandered around for a few days in the desert, lost, out of food, no water. And he looked on the horizon and he saw what looked like a little shack and he walked towards that shack. And as he got to it, it turned out it was a little store own by a Jewish merchant. "And the Taliban warrior went up to him and said, "I need water, give me some water." And the merchant said, "I'm sorry, I don't have any water but would you like a tie. We have a nice sale of ties today." "Where upon the Taliban erupted into a stream of language that I can't repeat, about Israel, about Jewish people, about the man himself, about his family, and just said, "I need water, you try to sell me ties, you people don't get it." "The merchant stood there until the Taliban was through with his diatribe and said, "Well I'm sorry I don't have water for you and I forgive you for all of the insults you've levied against me, my family, my country. But I will help you out. If you go over that hill and walk about two miles there is a restaurant there and they will have all the water you need." "And the Taliban, instead of saying thanks, still muttering under his breath, disappears over the hill, only to come back an hour later, and walking up to the merchant says, "You're brother tells me I need a tie to get into the restaurant."

Really, now, is that going to sink U.S.-Israeli relations further into the ground as some thin-skinned pundits assert?

Lighten up, guys and gals.

Readers comments are welcome as long as they remain civil. We reserve the right to delete any comments that are vulgar, libelous and totally irrelevant to this posting. -- Jer

1 comment:

i just don't understand this dust-up. i mean, not only is the joke kinda funny... but to me it comes across as the two guys, who happen to be jews, are messing with the taliban like a cat plays with a mouse.

i don't see this as negative. at all.

these days it seems that when people get "offended" at someone else's remarks, it's because they dragged some history along with it and assigned some massive additional baggage that they're carrying, and not the speaker.

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Welcome: An intelligent and articulate discussion is desired in these days of partisan politics. These postings are commentary on national politics, current events, sports and any other stuff that generates civil conversation. My career in the newspaper business extends more than 25 years at the Klamath Falls Hearld & News, Tustin News, Orange Daily News, Santa Ana Register and San Diego Evening Tribune. Son of a vegetable farmer, I was raised in the predominately Mexican village of San Juan Capistrano. At age 11, my family moved to the nearby coastal city of Laguna Beach where body surfing became my favorite sport. I attended the private Webb School of California near Pomona. I graduated majoring in political science at the University of California at Davis. After my newspaper career, I became a landscape contractor in San Diego for 10 years and then groundskeeper for a RV resort on the bank of the Rogue River seven miles east of Gold Beach, Ore. I resumed my writing career, first with emails, and later launching this blogsite in 2007.